Cholanaikkan
Sign in to saveThe Cholanaikkans are an ethnic group or indigenous community from India. They primarily inhabit the southern Kerala State, especially Silent Valley National Park, and are one of the last remaining hunter-gatherer tribes of the region. The Cholanaikkans speak the Cholanaikkan language, which belongs to the Dravidian family.
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- Etymology
- Background
- Anthropology and culture
- Economy
- Language
- See also
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The Cholanaikkans are an ethnic group or indigenous community from India. They primarily inhabit the southern Kerala State, especially Silent Valley National Park, and are one of the last remaining hunter-gatherer tribes of the region. The Cholanaikkans speak the Cholanaikkan language, which belongs to the Dravidian family.
==Etymology== The Cholanaikkan call themselves as ‘Malanaikan’ or ‘Sholanaikan’. They are called Cholanaikan because they inhabit the interior forests. ‘Chola’ or ‘shola’ means patches of stunted forest lined by grasslands, and ‘naikan’ means King. They are said to have migrated from Mysore forests.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “Cholanaikkan” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.